"The Right Stuff for Turkeys"

By Bob Robb

Contributing Writer, American Hunter

Last season when I was hunting turkeys at Miller Creek Ranch in central Texas, I found that gobblers were henned up beyond belief, gobbling on the roost, then clamming up like Mafia members on the witness stand as soon as they hit the ground. In six days of hunting, I managed to call one big bird up for a friend who had never been turkey hunting before, and he thankfully hammered him. (He had hunted a total of two hours and went home thinking, hey, what's so tough about this?)

Oh, don't worry. I got my licks in, too, but it was only because I have a bowhunter's mentality and started turkey hunting as if I were bowhunting mature whitetails. That is to say, I found places where the birds were crossing fence lines heading back to their roost, built some ground blinds and waited them patiently out. And I also put the sneak on a big gobbler strutting in a wheat field next to the edge of a wooded creek channel. I killed that 4 year old at eight steps. But none of it was classic turkey hunting like you see on the cable hunting TV shows. No gadgets, specialty items or high-tech devices we've used to chase down my birds.

Like me, outfitter Stony Trainham of Miller Creek Ranch has evolved from a hunter with no money who took afield nothing more than a gun, binoculars and a sharp knife, to one who brought so much gear that he ran out of pockets and daypack space. Now, both of us are back to the basics, believing that the less you haul around the better you'll know how to use what you have, and thus be more efficient in the woods. The key is to bring the right stuff.

The famous conservationist, writer and sportsman Aldo Leopold once wrote that the nimrods of his era were becoming a gang of "gadgeteers," more enamored with their toys than becoming skilled woodsmen. I am pretty much the anti-gadgeteer, unless a new high-tech whatchamacallit proves its worth to me. One of those gadgets is the modern GPS unit. I have not found a more useful tool in many a year.

The GPS can help you get found if you become lost. It can also mark downed big-game animals that have to be packed out later without worrying about leaving a trail of bright flagging. It has a 101 uses, and the newest units are simple to use.

We used them turkey hunting for several things. The most important was the ability to roost a gobbler and mark both his exact tree and, even better, the exact spot where I wanted to set up in the dark to try and catch him as he flew down off the roost at first light. No need to alert him with a flashlight, no need to make a lot of noise getting settled in, just read the unit and follow the trail and you're ready. Other times, we'd get into a new area in the early afternoon, mark the truck on the GPS and head off. When we saw or heard turkeys, we chased them wherever, with no fear of not being to find the truck again in the flat, brush-choked terrain. I doubt I'll be hunting much without one anymore.

Trainham made a great point about gadgets. "There is no substitution for woodsmanship when hunting," he observed. "Too many folks believe they can buy all this fancy stuff and become Daniel Boone overnight, but that isn't the way it is." A GPS can simplify things and be helpful, he said, but hunters still need to know how to locate birds and know what to do once they find them. "You cannot buy that knowledge at any price."

Truer words were never spoken.

How to Put Down A Black Bear

Broadside:

Most hunters are used to aiming behind the shoulder on deer for a double-lung shot. This works on bears, too; you can aim right behind the top of the shoulder and nearly halfway up the side. Better yet, break one or both shoulders. A bullet that busts bone and bursts lungs is the best way to anchor a bear. Bullet and bone fragments should damage the lungs and maybe even the heart. If you accidentally hit high you should still sever the bear's spine.

Going-Away:

Take this shot only on a wounded bear that needs to be anchored. Your target is the top of the tail, not below it, so nervous and skeletal systems are hit. You want to split the pelvis and take out the back legs so a finishing shot can be taken.

Charging:

Try to brain a charging bear. From the front, your target is just above a line that would join the top of the eyes. If possible, wait till the head points down or at a 90-degree angle to the bullet path. Keep shooting until it is down, as an adrenaline-charged bruin can be hard to stop.

Quartering-On:

If it's facing you, aim just below the jaw to drive the bullet through the neck and chest. If it's quartering toward you, aim for the shoulder you can see and send the bullet through the chest cavity. If it's quartering away, do this in reverse by shooting up through the chest to the far shoulder.

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1976

The year that Sumner, Mo., erected a statue of "Maxie" to commemorate being the "Wild Goose Capital of the World."

65 Feet

Maxie sports a 65-foot wingspan while resting on a cinderblock building in a community park.

4

The number of cackling subspecies.

fast fact

The cackling goose, a smaller-bodied goose prominent in Canada and Alaska, is a tundra-breeder with considerably more black plumage than the Canada. At one time, the cackling goose was considered the smallest subspecies of the Canada, but is now recognized as a separate species.